Angelina Jolie to have more cancer-prevention surgery

Angelina Jolie has confirmed she will have more cancer-preventing surgery, after a double mastectomy last year.

The 38-year-old actress had the procedure after discovering she was at high risk of developing breast cancer.

“I decided to be proactive and to minimise the risk as much I could,” she said at the time.

Now in an interview with Entertainment Weekly she said she is “very happy” with her decision to have the operation.

“There’s still another surgery to have, which I haven’t yet. I’ll get advice from all these wonderful people who I’ve been talking to, to get through that next stage,” she said.

“I was very fortunate to have great doctors and very, very fortunate to have a good recovery and have a project like Unbroken to have something to be really focused on, to be getting healthy for, and to be able to just get right back to work.”

She said she has had a lot of support from the public.

“I was very, very moved by all the support and kindness from so many people.”

The mother-of-six has previously explained her reasons for having the surgery, arguing she needed to minimise her risk after her mother died from ovarian cancer aged 56.

In an article entitled My Medical Choice, she explained that her mother fought cancer for nearly a decade.

The Hollywood star’s doctors estimated she had an 87% risk of breast cancer and a 50% risk of ovarian cancer, because of genes she had inherited.

Prof Hani Gabra, Director of the Ovarian Cancer Action Research Centre at Imperial College, said women with the BRCA1/2 gene mutation have “a very stark choice”.

“Medical science currently has limited options to help these women beyond removal of the breasts and/or ovaries,” he said.

“However, by choosing to have a preventative hysterectomy and removing the ovaries and fallopian tubes will significantly reduce the chance of developing ovarian cancer.”

Prof Gabra added: “By removing the ovaries the woman will lose her fertility and go through the menopause, which will be more sudden than going through it naturally and more slowly and increase her risk of developing osteoporosis and other conditions.

“This obviously has significant impact especially if the woman is still planning a family. For any woman worried about this, they should discuss it with their doctor.”